A Room of One's Own
by whitchry9
Summary: Written for a prompt. When a severe head injury lands John in a coma, somehow he ends up in Sherlock's mind palace. It's actually pretty nice there, and John is entertaining the notion of staying there, rather than returning to his broken body. But Sherlock isn't taking it as well, and John can feel him breaking around him. Five parts.
1. Chapter 1

John was surprised to find how roomy Sherlock's mind palace was.

He's obviously heard the word palace, and figured it had to be grand and such, but he didn't think it would have such depth. There were floor and wings, all filled with carefully labelled rooms. Nothing was out of place.

* * *

But he was getting ahead of himself.

* * *

It had taken a long time for him to get out of his own room, which was massive. It looked like an old library, packed with bits of information, facts, sweater preferences, the way he took his tea, how to tell when his leg hurt.

It amazed John. He'd known Sherlock was collecting information on him, but he didn't expect it to be so meticulously collected and catalogued.

It was astounding.

* * *

He was still ahead of himself. Perhaps. Was he?

Perhaps not. It had taken him a while to come to the conclusion of where he was, and even longer still before he realized what happened.

He'd woken up in the library. He'd had no clue about why he was there, or even how he'd gotten there. It was only by wandering around and looking at the things that he realized it was his room. Or at least it was all about him.

That was how he realized he was in his room of Sherlock's mind palace.

* * *

He didn't know how long it took him to realize that, or how long it took him before he left the room, after pouring over every scrap of information, facts about himself that he hadn't even realized. Time didn't seem normal there, but how, he couldn't quite say.

* * *

He only realized after reading through his jumper catalogue that the room had a door.

He stared at it for a while, curious as to where it might lead. If he stepped out it, would he fall into Sherlock's brain? Who knew what else was out there. Was the rest of it organized this well, or was John in some way special?

Perhaps the rest was just a void.

But he couldn't stay in his room forever.

So he opened the door and found a hallway on the other side.

It was when he stepped out that he realized how gorgeous it was. A genuine palace. Marble floors in the hallways, each room carefully decorated to match its purpose. There was a room containing samples of however many different types of tobacco ash there was. Another contained perfume samples for easy identification.

He worried about getting lost, but since he wasn't going anywhere, he supposed it didn't matter.

* * *

John found a room where he could he was Sherlock was seeing. It was labelled _eyes. _

He was staring at himself.

There was an audio function, and he switched it on.

"There is evidence of minimal brain function. He wasn't breathing on his own, so a machine is helping him. It was a rather severe head injury that he suffered."

He detailed surgery, but the hearing faded out at that point, and John realized it was because Sherlock was too focused on the sight of John to remember to listen at the same time.

He did hear the ending though.

"Complete recovery is nearly impossible with this level of injury. I'm sorry, but you have to be prepared for him to have some level of brain damage when or if he does awaken."

"No," John heard Sherlock say. "No. John will recover. He has before. He will again."

* * *

John left. He couldn't hear any more.

* * *

He wandered the halls.

The Mycroft room was tiny, but cozy. Of course, it was also dusty, like Sherlock hadn't been taking care of it.

Mrs Hudson's room was a physical embodiment of her personality, soft and flowered. John felt safe there, and would often return when he was feeling stressed about his current state (whatever the hell it was) or Sherlock's panic managed to seep out of his carefully designed worry room and spread everywhere.

Lots of other people had their own rooms, but none as detailed or as large as John's.


	2. Chapter 2

He returned to his own room often, revelling in the comfort of the familiarity. He probably didn't need to sleep, but did, curling up on a pile of jumpers he'd found in a closet.

* * *

He spent a lot of time in the memory room, with its massive collection of shelves and movie theatre like atmosphere.

He would load the projector with reels of film and sit in the red velvet chairs.

John never touched the things that Sherlock hadn't shared. It was a lot of things, but there were plenty of things he could see.

There was the time with the cabbie and the pills, but this time it was from Sherlock's point of view.

There was Sherlock being strangled in Soo Lin's flat, and John couldn't help but feel anger for remaining unaware, for letting Sherlock nearly die, _again. _

There was their first meeting. John felt Sherlock's near glee at having met someone exciting, finally.

And of course there was Sherlock first seeing John at the pool. The momentary terror of betrayal, that split second of believing it was indeed John who had done all those awful things, that he had been deceived by the one person he considered his friend. That terror was soon replaced by the realization that John was the final pip, trapped in the bomb.

He stopped watching after that.

* * *

He went to see what was happening every day. Every time he was greeted by the sight of himself, unchanged.

At least he was no worse. At least he wasn't dead. _At least they hadn't pulled the plug._

* * *

John knew what comas were, what they meant. Far too much in fact.

And if he'd been in a coma, how many days had it been? Nine so far? His chances of a full recovery were dropping.

So even if he did wake up, which he couldn't guarantee, because no matter how much he wanted to live, he couldn't just _will _himself alive.

And even if he did, John knew that there was no chance he'd be normal. Perhaps his intelligence wouldn't be touched, perhaps it would be. Perhaps he'd have no speech, perhaps he wouldn't be able to read. He may have to relearn how to walk, how to brush his teeth, how to get dressed on his own.

No matter what happened, John knew he would never be the same.

It would probably just be best to stay where he was.


	3. Chapter 3

He could feel Sherlock breaking around him. Not in big ways, there were no earthquakes, no entire wings of the building falling away, but there were cracks. Sherlock was cracking.

In so many tiny little ways, Sherlock was falling apart.

It hurt John to see.

* * *

He'd go watch what Sherlock was seeing, looking at himself through blurry vision. He was still in a coma, still not breathing on his own. It should have frightened him, but it didn't. Not anymore. He was used to this strange new reality.

* * *

On the nineteenth day, John wanted to know what had happened.

He'd gone to the memory room, selected the dated reel (no title on this one, and John suspected he knew why) and loaded it in the film projector.

He sat down to watch, unsure of what it would be, but dreading it all the same.

* * *

The setup. John had been missing for three days, and Sherlock was frantic. Lestrade hadn't been able to locate him, and even Mycroft didn't have a lead.

Until he did.

* * *

They found John on a farm outside of London, broken, battered, bleeding. Between the head injury and the shock, he was barely conscious, only remaining awake long enough to see Sherlock come to rescue him.

"S'lock?" he'd muttered, before collapsing into Sherlock's arms.

He had to watch from Sherlock's point of view as an ambulance arrived and tore John from his arms. The sentiment that Sherlock had felt nearly broke John right there.

But still, he continued as paramedics intubated him, shone lights in his eyes, and raced off to the hospital.

The memory stopped when a blanket was thrown over Sherlock's shoulders. He didn't even try to take it off.

* * *

John slept in Mrs Hudson's room that night, needing the comfort it brought him. He had to bear Sherlock's pain as well as his own.


	4. Chapter 4

It had been twenty one days since John had fallen into his coma.

And it was the day that Sherlock decided to stop it all.

It was what John had wanted, he'd made it clear to Sherlock before that he wouldn't want to live like this, broken and a burden.

He just never thought it would hurt Sherlock so much to do it.

* * *

The hallways of the mind palace flooded with saltwater. Sherlock was crying.

And with that, he realized he couldn't stay there any more. Sherlock's mind palace was nice and everything, but John could tell if he stayed there much longer, it would completely crumble around him, burying him in memories that were too personal to stand.

He had to go back. (If he could. He didn't even know if he could. But John knew he had to try.)

* * *

There was one room he never went to.

One room he never even peeked in.

Every room in Sherlock's mind palace was carefully labelled, and John had never found a label that was incorrect. That was exactly the reason he'd stayed away from that one.

John took a deep breath, his hand on the doorknob.

And he opened the door labelled _The End._

* * *

Sherlock exhaled.

And as he did, as the ventilator was unhooked from John's mouth, he felt like he lost something, some presence of John. Like he was gone.

And Sherlock supposed he was.

Because John would no longer breathe on his own. And in only a few minutes, the brain activity that he had would cease.

Soon John would die.

And all Sherlock could do was watch.

Except, _except, _John didn't. He didn't stop breathing, his brain activity didn't cease, and he didn't die.

If Sherlock believed in them, he would have called it a miracle.

But he didn't. So he called he what he knew it would be all along. John recovering.


	5. Chapter 5

At first, John thought it had been a dream. At least, when he was capable of forming thoughts, that's what he figured.

There were snatches, images of hallways, perfume scents, images of himself.

But nothing that made sense, not in the way that things were supposed to be.

* * *

It was only when he awoke that he realized it was real. All of it. It was all real; perhaps not in the sense that everything else was real, because he couldn't touch it or provide any proof, but it was just as real as anything else he'd experienced.

And he'd make sure it was. Later. When he could form a coherent thought, and manage to actually open his mouth to speak to Sherlock.

Then he would get proof.

* * *

John didn't know how long it was from when he left Sherlock's mind palace to when he was finally awake. Things were rather hazy. But he knew that Sherlock was always there.

And when he was finally lucid, Sherlock hugged him. Actually hugged him, throwing his long arms around John and squeezing tight.

John didn't even know what to do about that, so he just let it happen.

"I thought I'd lost you," he said, matter of fact. "I shouldn't have given up on you though. If I had been quicker, if I'd done it even a day earlier..." he trailed off, not wanting to say it.

"You decision was what made me come back," John told him softly, waiting for a response.

There wasn't one.

"Sherlock?" he asked.

"Yes John?"

"Didn't you hear me?"

Sherlock made no motion that he'd heard him.

Maybe it was because he hadn't.

John opened his mouth, but no words came out. They were there, sitting, waiting, but refused to budge.

"Sherlock," he repeated. "Sherlock. Sherlock."

He was verging on panic now, but had no way to convey it, stuck with only one word in his vocabulary.

_Sherlock._

There was the brain damage that John had known would be present.

He couldn't have complained though (if he could, not that he could, words and everything) because he knew it could have been much worse. This, he could recover from. He could manage. They could manage.

* * *

There was so much John wanted to say.

_I was in your mind palace._

_I watched the whole thing happen._

_I came back because it hurt too much to watch you do this._

* * *

Of course, none of the words were available, floating just beyond his grasp.

So he said the one thing that he knew Sherlock would understand, that would remind him that it would be alright.

"_Sherlock._"


End file.
